Hunka Hunka Burnin' Iron

Elvis Presley’s firearms set world records.

- Meghan Saar

Two days before The Guardian published its exposé, “Can’t Help Falling in Price,” about how the deaths of Baby Boomers has sent Elvis Presley memorabilia values plummeting, Rock Island Auction dramatically changed the tune.

Our friends across the pond hadn’t likely heard the news yet of the world record-setting firearms sale on May 5, 2017. “A King’s Ransom for the King’s Revolvers,” the auction house announced. Elvis’s Smith and Wesson Model 19-2 hammered down for $170,000, and the Colt Python, for $150,000.

Forty years ago, on August 16, Elvis died of a heart attack at his Graceland home in Memphis, Tennessee, at the age of 42. On that same day, in 1960, he had begun acting in his second Western, Flaming Star. One of the film’s Indian warriors, Rodd Redwing, taught Elvis a thing or two about handling his pistols. Redwing had also given lessons to Clint Eastwood for CBS’s Rawhide.

The two budding actors became pals during the 1960s. “I was always wearing a gun,” Eastwood told